


Crossed Paths (The Oddly Glitchy Interface remix)

by pensnest



Category: Backstreet Boys, Popslash
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-13
Updated: 2012-04-13
Packaged: 2017-11-03 14:20:59
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,922
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/382273
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pensnest/pseuds/pensnest
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Howie spends as much time as he can afford with a lover whose face he can't see—until one day, he bumps into the man whose face seems to fit his dreams.</p><p>So does Brian.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crossed Paths (The Oddly Glitchy Interface remix)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Aeiouna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aeiouna/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Crossed Paths](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28844) by [Erika (Aeiouna)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aeiouna/pseuds/Erika). 



_Our eyes meet, and he makes me gasp, so full of love and lust and everything I want him to be. We kiss, our heights ideally matched so I have only to tilt my mouth up a fraction for our lips to press together, soft, warm, and his tongue slides into my mouth. My eyes close, though I don't want to shut him out, don't want to shut out our surroundings, the sunlight shining in through the bright window to illuminate our own little world, but I can feel him, my hands wander freely up his back and shoulders, down his arms and over to cup his sweet ass. He pulls me closer, breaks the kiss and slides instead down my offered neck, lipping and nipping and making me gasp again…_

The warning beep sounded. _Two minutes and thirty seconds remaining._

Jolted back to reality, Howie stepped back, and his lover's vague blue eyes clouded with bewilderment. "Dismiss," Howie said softly, and "Dismiss!" again as his first command failed to register. The scene dissolved, bedroom, balcony and man all gone, leaving the stark grid of the public holodeck and Howie fighting for control. 

He couldn't exit like this, flushed and erect and unsatisfied. Howie stepped through the other door, into the adjacent shower unit, and dialed for lukewarm and needle pressure. The recycled water's brief assault on his skin calmed him down. He hit the button for cleanser, then water again, and blasts of hot air to dry him quickly. His fantasy sloughed off, Howie dressed at speed and bolted out into the corridor with perhaps three seconds to spare before his time expired and he was charged for another hour.

"Argh!"

"Ow!" Howie rubbed his forehead from the clash. "I'm so sorry, I didn't see you th—" His throat went dry as he stared into the startled face of the man he'd crashed into in his precipitate exit from the holodeck. How was that even possible? The perfect height, the perfect build, blond hair—it might have been the man from his program. Except that Howie had left his holodeck lover's face blurred, and this one had distinctive features and blue eyes even brighter than the ones he'd dialed for. "So sorry! Gotta scramble," he blurted, and fled.

*

That was weird. That was... that was incredibly weird, Brian thought, staring at the fast-retreating figure heading up the curve of the corridor. Was he dreaming, or had that guy who just crashed into him been the living embodiment of his fantasy guy? Actually, even better than his fantasy, with those soft, tempting lips and gorgeous brown eyes—even if they had been wide, startled and filled with embarrassment.

It wasn't surprising the guy was heading away from him as fast as he could go. Brian didn't expect ever to find what he was looking for. Maybe he wasn't even sure exactly what he was looking for, so finding it —nah. 

He pressed his palm to the holodeck's access point. The door slid open, and he stepped through, inserted his holochip into the program point and dialed an hour. The rates were steep at this time of the daycycle, but he needed to wind down or he'd never be able to sleep. It always took him several cycles to get into a new sleep pattern when he had to change shift. He went straight for the shower unit, needing to wash off the day's work-dust first, and felt better even before he returned to the holodeck and commanded, "Run program."

The familiar room shimmered into life around him—a bright, sunlit bedroom about twenty times the size of his station cubie. Polished wooden furniture, blue and yellow rugs on the wooden floor, a huge bed with a blue coverlet furled back and, above the bed, a cheerful picture of a beach scene with scarlet umbrellas. The glass doors that led to the balcony stood wide, and a slight breeze, soft and warm, shifted the gauzy curtains. 

The man, his man, was on the balcony, looking out at the sea, the distant horizon where blue faded into blue and the world curved down instead of up. "Hey," Brian said, stepping forward, and curled his arms around his lover's waist. He nuzzled at the silky brown hair, soft curls tickling his cheek, and kissed his man's arched neck.

*

Howie didn't stop scrambling until he was a quarter round the diameter. He'd missed his off-corridor by about four junctions, but it took him a while even to dare turn around. How could this be possible? Had he imagined it? His holographic lover, in the flesh? No. No, it couldn't be true, it wasn't possible. And after all, he couldn't really say the man he'd met—the man he'd run right into—was actually the man from the holodeck program. He'd never seen the holodeck man's face in detail, never seen anything so chiseled and sharp as those amazing cheekbones, anything so bright as those blue eyes, so how could he possibly know?

But it felt so real.

* * *

Eighteen cycles, and Brian doubted he'd ever find the guy again. He'd checked through a bunch of station offtime ads—there were always people looking for love, sex or just company—but his guy didn't seem to have posted anything. He'd found himself scanning every face as he went through his cycles, but this place was huge and there was no guarantee his fantasy guy was even still on board. A lot of transients came through here. Even if the guy was on board, if they ran on different shifts they might never meet again. Brian would just have to meet him here, on the holodeck, like before, and try to pretend that it was satisfying, like before.

Well, that was odd. Brian looked about him in confusion—he hadn't given the run command yet, but here was his program already up. The blue-covered bed, the balcony with its view of the sea, just as it was supposed to be. He stared around in confusion—wait, the picture was different. Sunflowers, where there should have been red umbrellas.

Probably just a glitch. Public holodecks were notorious for poor detail management, which was why Brian kept his program on a private chip, not uploaded to the main system. Or maybe it was an upgrade, there had been some talk about the public decks getting an overhaul. About time, he thought. If the deck brought his favorite program to the front when he palmed the lock, that was kinda nice. Much better than walking onto the bare grid. He started to strip off his work clothes, leaving them on his usual wooden chair, but before he'd got out of more than his T-top, the shower unit door opened and—

What?

Also, huh?

And also, wow!

The beautiful brown-eyed man stared at him, then shook his head impatiently and said, "Dismiss."

 _You have one hour remaining_ , was the holodeck's neutral response.

"That can't be right," said the brown-eyed man.

"It's my program," Brian interrupted. "I just paid for an hour." And he hadn't uploaded his program yet, so how could the holodeck be displaying it?

The brown-eyed man stared at him, recognition and dismay visible on his face. "It can't be. It shouldn't have let you in, I have a minute or so left..."

"But this is my program," Brian explained.

"No, it—" The other man paused. "Your program? This room, this place, it's yours?"

"Yeah. Well, one or two details seem a bit off, but, yeah. That painting's wrong, and I don't remember putting plants on the balcony."

At that moment, the final warning beep sounded, and the room dissolved into grid. 

"Wait, I'll show you," Brian said, and inserted his chip. His room reappeared, minus potted plants and sunflowers, and the other man gaped. "Hold animation," Brian commanded, hurriedly. He did not want his holographic man appearing, not right now.

"Is this, is this what home looks like to you?" said the brown-eyed man.

"Yes," Brian said. "It's not any place I ever lived, back on Earth, but it's everything I ever wanted."

"Me, too," said the other man. "Except for... except for someone to share it with."

"I'm Brian, Brian Littrell." He held out a hand, and the hand that shook it seemed so familiar, he didn't want to let go. "I think we met before."

"Howie. Dorough." Howie blushed. He looked even more adorable with pink cheeks. "I seem to remember trying to break your nose with my skull. I'm really sorry about that."

"The thing is, Howie," Brian said, cautiously, "when I run this program, there's usually someone in here to share it with me. A man."

"I... I actually do that, too," Howie confessed.

"And the strange thing, the strange thing about this is, the man I programmed, he's not somebody I ever met." Brian paused, not sure how to phrase what he wanted to say.

"Can—can I ask you something, something personal?" Howie said, tentatively. Brian nodded, his heart thumping like a deuterium presser as he waited to find out what Howie would say. "Did you ever realize you met the man from your program, even though it didn't seem like that was possible?"

"Yeah," said Brian. "Eighteen cycles ago, when you ran into me."

They stared at one another.

"I guess," Howie said, "the holodeck bases its characters on real people.... Or is there another explanation?"

"It's against the law to holorepresent a real person without their permission. Except for news programs and such."

"But it might be using real people for a base, like, as a reference, maybe? With my—my character, I never had a clear look at his face," Howie said. "I didn't like the generic options, they never seemed real, so I selected the blurring option. But your face is how he ought to look, only I didn't know that until I saw you." Howie looked the way Brian felt, confused and stunned and excited. "All this time, I've been so lonely, and I find you right here on the holodeck."

"I'm glad it was me," Brian said, and drew Howie closer. "Because for me, it was you. I even thought..." his nose was almost touching Howie's nose, "thought about programming in big brown eyes, but they'd never have matched up."

Their lips met, and everything that had been missing in the artificial world was suddenly real. The texture of Howie's lips, the faintly minty taste of his tongue, the lingering scent of cleanser on his neck, and tiny puffs of breath against Brian's skin as they embraced.

"We have almost an hour," Brian murmured. "You want to go for a walk on the beach?"

"Later," Howie said. "I guess we should talk, but right now, I just want to touch you, kiss you, I want you to be real for me."

*

"Happy anniversary, baby." Howie leaned in for a kiss and wrapped his arms around Brian's neck as Brian inserted his holochip into the program point. "What's it going to be today?" Three-sixty-five cycles, and they'd made love in old-fashioned four-poster beds, waterbeds, couches, fur rugs by the fireside, in an oval bathtub, in a real water shower, in a hayloft, in the woods, on the beach, in null gravity, in fluffy cotton candy clouds and even, on one never-to-be-repeated occasion, in jello.

The grid shimmered into wooden floor, pale walls, and sunshine streaming through an open balcony door onto a blue coverlet.

"Perfect," Howie said. "Just perfect."

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Snarkyllama for the beta.


End file.
